Scratchbuilt Koban

[marknewton]

Ages ago I made a scale drawing of a typical koban, but it's not until now that I've started building it.

 

The basic shell of the koban is clear styrene sourced from CD jewel cases. This will form the window glazing once the outer shell goes on.

 

 

The interior walls and floors are 60thou styrene.

 

 

The interior is a sliding fit inside the shell. That allows me access to the interior lighting, which is grain-of-wheat bulbs. I used these in preference to LEDS simply because I had a heap of them on hand. The small diameter holes are for the lightbulbs, the large ones are for the conduits that carry the leads. I wanted every room to be individually lit, and for the bulbs to be mounted in the ceilings. To me there's nothing worse than seeing an illuminated building with the light shining up from the floor.

 

 

 

Test-fitting the outer rear wall. I tried two methods for making the window openings on this wall. The first was to drill four small holes in the corners then cut out the waste material. The other was to scribe and snap the entire bottom of the wall, remove the window area then glue the wall back together. I think this is the better method of the two.

 

 

Cheers,

 

Mark.

[cteno4]

Mark,

 

Very fun project! Keep us posted.

 

Someone had posted a lon while back doing a similar structure in n scale using those little plastic cubes folks use on their desks to hold paper clips.

 

Cheers

 

Jeff

[KenS]

That's a neat idea.  And looking quite good so far.  Are you planning interior detail (people, desks) for the bulbs to illuminate?

[marknewton]

Thanks for compliments! I'm going to detail the interior of the front office, and maybe the kitchen. But the rest of the windows will have blinds/curtains to block the view. I'm keen, but not that keen!  

 

Cheers,

 

Mark.

[cteno4]

its fun with HO as you have the potential to actually see in a window (you have to look very hard with N scale!) and doing curtains, tables, etc is not quite as tiny and fiddly as N scale. also lots of doll house stuff available if you do get keen on it!

 

jeff

[marknewton]

Jeff, I agree, it's fun, but I leaned the hard way years ago that interior detail is largely wasted without interior lighting. Back when I was into scale aircraft modelling I built a 1/48th scale Lancaster bomber, and went all-out on detailing the cockpit. Many hours of work later, the canopy went on, and you couldn't see any of it! 

 

But the doll house furnishings sound interesting...

 

Cheers,

 

Mark.

[cteno4]

Mark,

 

ouch! same here on n scale houses when i was a kid!

 

not as much doll house stuff done at ho but some

 

http://www.oakridgehobbies.com/index.php/dollhouse-supplies-dollhouses-assembled-dollhouses-dollhouse-miniatures-dollhouse-kits-dollhouse-furniture-children-s-dollhouses-play-dollhouses-dollhouse-lighting/ho-scale-eighth-scale-fezziwig-dollhouse-furniture

 

they do more in 1/144 stuff as its 1/12 scale (normal doll house scale) models in a 1/12 scale doll house! so when you want to furnish your doll house in your doll house!

 

http://www.virtualdollhouse.net/VDSTORE/Metal2.htm

http://www.asheilasshed.com.au/as144.htm

 

they do make some building details in ho

 

http://www.virtualdollhouse.net/VDSTORE/Grandt-line2.htm

 

if you do want to get into making your own furniture, some great little tutorials here

 

http://www.btz.se/minis/DIY/index.php

 

cheers

 

jeff

[Jcarlton]

fezywiggs is an old  HO scale SSLtd line:

http://scale-structures.com/Page/ss_main.html

It's mostly early 20th Century in style.

The Grandt windows are also HO.

Tichy also makes nice windows and such:

http://www.tichytraingroup.com/

For more modern office furniture iwould try the Walthers HO catalog and look at the preiser or Merton stuff.  I seem to remember an office set.

There's also this:

http://www.modelbuilderssupply.com/product_info.php?cPath=45_220&products_id=2291

It's under scale, but Japanese furniture is on the small side anyway.  Model supply also makes a kitchen.

[marknewton]

I wasn't happy with the first version of the rear wall, so I made another, better one, using the method I described above. Happy with that, I've made the other three walls the same way -

 

 

- then trial-fitted them to the inner shell.

 

 

 

Once the glued joints have fully cured, I've then wet-sanded both sides of the wall with 320 grade carbide paper. That removes the score lines and other cutting marks. It also gives the styrene a bit of a rough surface for the next stage of the build, which is to paint the walls with Tamiya texture paint. I've seen this used to give the effect of cement-rendered walls, so I thought I'd give it a try. Once the walls are painted, the window frames and storm shutter guides will go on. These will be pre-painted, becuase I hate fiddly masking jobs!

 

All the best,

 

Mark.

[Lawrence]

Ingenious building Mark, look forward to seeing the process all the way through

[cteno4]

mark,

 

back to the drawing board, but fast recovery!

 

ive actually found that good old craft store acrylic paint in my really cheapo siphon air brush (the kind that just pushes the air past a nipple going into the paint reservoir) actually gives a decent n scale texture. since its fairly big pigment particle paint and fairly gooey it tends to go in bigger drops and gives that textured look. i was never intending to use that brush for anything but putting down more blended colors on scenery base, but now think im going to try a building with it! might not be texturie enough for HO, but im guessing textures need about the same just to give the visible effect at a couple of feet.

 

btw after digging up those doll house links for this thread i had looked through last year, i started to get back into thinking about the mini details like furniture and such. found this guy with fantastic miniature making skills: http://www.nanotray.com/  click on the 1/144 link and you will see his turned 1/144 scale chess set! it actually got me interested and i started turning some n scale flower pots and vases this weekend. quite fun and challenging to do all your work w/in a space of a few mm!

 

cheers

 

jeff

[marknewton]

Ive actually found that good old craft store acrylic paint in my really cheapo siphon air brush (the kind that just pushes the air past a nipple going into the paint reservoir) actually gives a decent n scale texture. since its fairly big pigment particle paint and fairly gooey it tends to go in bigger drops and gives that textured look. i was never intending to use that brush for anything but putting down more blended colors on scenery base, but now think im going to try a building with it! might not be texturie enough for HO, but im guessing textures need about the same just to give the visible effect at a couple of feet.

 

Funny you mention that, Jeff, I used to use the same method to put a bit of texture on simple architectural models - I'd completely forgotten about it!   Good thing you reminded me, if the Tamiya paint doesn't work out I'll have another go with the spraygun method.

 

btw after digging up those doll house links for this thread i had looked through last year, i started to get back into thinking about the mini details like furniture and such. found this guy with fantastic miniature making skills: http://www.nanotray.com/  click on the 1/144 link and you will see his turned 1/144 scale chess set!

 

The man's insane!  

 

it actually got me interested and i started turning some n scale flower pots and vases this weekend. quite fun and challenging to do all your work w/in a space of a few mm!

 

Challenging, all right. But if he can do 1/144th, and you can do N scale, then surely I can do some in 1/80th? I'll have to give it a go.

 

Cheers,

 

Mark.

[cteno4]

i was so impressed with the cheapo $10 siphon external mix spray gun i got. it actually worked with craft paints and you can have 5 bottles of different paint sitting there to keep blending and playing with, just pop them on and off, no clearing the gun, etc. clean up is a breeze. while i would not use it for fine painting, to do scenery stuff or wall painting like this it was pretty cool. nice to be able to spray cheap acrylics in the basement to fiddle and not get all involved with setup, cleanup and fumes!

 

yeah give it a whirl, the furniture is much easier at HO than N, that little bit of difference means a lot on the tight spaces and really small stock stuff. the dollhouse links have some fun and quick tricks to turn out nice stuff pretty fast and again at HO it would be pretty easy. still doable at n to get fancy, but its a fiddle! the turning too would work so much better at HO. i popped out a rough acrylic wine glass at HO scale w/o much trouble.

 

jeff